Influenza viruses are three genera of genetically diverse single-stranded RNA, enveloped viruses in the Orthomyxoviridae family. Influenza spreads worldwide in seasonal epidemics, resulting in about three to five million cases of severe illness and 250,000 to 500,000 deaths annually. Influenza is known to be transmitted through the air by coughs and sneezes, through direct contact with bird droppings or nasal secretions, or through contact with contaminated surfaces. Influenza infection is characterized by fever, chills, cough, nasal congestion, runny nose, sneezing, body aches, fatigue, headache, watering eyes, reddened skin, and petechiae.
Other exemplary viruses include norovirus, dengue, and Ebola. Norovirus, for example, is a genus of genetically diverse single-stranded RNA, non-enveloped viruses in the Caliciviridae family. Norovirus is known to be transmitted by fecally-contaminated food or water, by person-to-person contact, and via aerosolization of the virus and subsequent contamination of surfaces. Noroviruses are the most common cause of viral gastroenteritis in humans and affect people of all ages. Norovirus infection is characterized by nausea, forceful vomiting, watery diarrhea, abdominal pain, and in some cases, loss of taste. General lethargy, weakness, muscle aches, headache, and low-grade fever may occur. The disease is usually self-limiting, and severe illness is rare. However, the virus affects around 267 million people and causes over 200,000 deaths each year.
Furthermore, the dengue virus, for example, is a mosquito-borne single positive-stranded RNA virus of the family Flaviviridae, genus Flavivirus. The dengue virus in one of five serotypes is the cause of dengue fever, but all serotypes can cause the full spectrum of disease, including dengue fever, dengue hemorrhagic fever, and dengue shock syndrome. The dengue virus is known to be transmitted by several species of mosquito within the genus Aedesa, primarily A. aegypti. Dengue fever is characterized by fever, headache, muscle and joint pains, and a characteristic skin rash. Dengue hemorrhagic fever is characterized by bleeding, low levels of blood platelets, and blood plasma leakage, while dengue shock syndrome is characterized by myocardial depression, circumoral cyanosis, petechiae, hematemesis, melena, epistaxis, and possible pneumonia and/or myocarditis. The dengue virus infects 50 to 528 million people worldwide annually, leading to half a million hospitalizations and approximately 25,000 deaths.
Additionally, Ebola virus, for example, is a genus of genetically diverse single-stranded RNA, enveloped viruses in the Filoviridae family. Ebola typically occurs in outbreaks with 1,716 cases in 24 outbreaks through 2013. However, as of November 2014, the 2014 outbreak alone has resulted in 14,413 reported cases and 5,504 deaths. Ebola is known to be transmitted through direct contact with blood or other bodily fluids of an infected human or other animal. Ebola infection is characterized by fever, sore throat, muscle pain, headaches, vomiting, diarrhea, rash, impaired liver and kidney function, and internal and external hemorrhaging.
Vaccines are not currently commercially available for norovirus, dengue, or Ebola but are desperately needed. Influenza vaccines, however, have been manufactured for over 70 years using a process that involves infecting embryonated chicken eggs with influenza virus. The process is difficult to automate, labor-intensive, costly and creates significant risk of contamination. Another significant drawback to current vaccine manufacturing is poor virus yield. Moreover, viruses can often evolve or mutate over time. In some cases the evolution of viruses can occur rather rapidly, which makes screening, identification, and distribution of neutralizing antibodies in a timely and cost-effective manner particularly difficult. Furthermore, the currently used technologies described above do not guarantee that the developed vaccine will be effective against the original human-circulating strain or any of its close relatives. The developed vaccines may not be effective because the evolutionary adaptation of the virus during propagation in eggs during vaccine production may potentially change the surface proteins of the viruses such that they induce the production of antibodies that, while able to effectively neutralize the egg-adapted virus, do not neutralize the original human strain.
Therefore there at least remains a need in the art for a method for rapidly designing pharmaceutical preparations for preventing viral infection that have adapted to growth in various culturing systems but maintain antigenic similarity to the original virus.